


An Estimated Distance

by teletou



Category: Mana Khemia: Alchemists of Al-Revis
Genre: M/M, Pining, Vayne has a thing for Roxis' hair, communication issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-27
Updated: 2015-09-27
Packaged: 2018-04-23 15:38:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4882396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teletou/pseuds/teletou
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Perhaps in worlds parallel to this one, where words comes easily to them, they've already settled into something different. Perhaps they could, in this world, too. </p><p>Vayne is willing to take the first step towards that possibility.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Estimated Distance

He stops, between the vertical door frames of his classroom. Time slows, perhaps only for him, in his little bubble of the universe. Long strands of blond hair flutters somewhere, disappears into the next room over. Vayne finds his eyes trailing behind, follows the wisps of a movement behind the cluster of students – crowds interweaving, muffled chatters – walking past and around him.

"Vayne?" Mr. Seppl's voice in the distance, and he blinks.

The last of his classmates walks inside, and Vayne is left in the corridor, aborted movements and half-formed actions, his fingers stretched out for something he can no longer see.

"Oh." He blushes, jerks his hand down to grip at the hem of his uniform blazer. "Sorry― I don’t know― Spacing out― I'm sorry...”

Vayne thinks he might have felt a ghost of a touch, light around his fingers, curls between the gaps before it fades, along with the memory of early morning today – a brush of long hair on the back of his palm as he shuffles past, across the atelier and out of the door.

He steps into the classroom, leaves the wooden door frames with his face warm around his cheeks.

 

* * *

 

 

“Do you enjoy this?”

The water ripples, as if reverberating against the bite in Roxis' voice. Vayne watches the tackle float bop around aimlessly in the gentle current, tugging the string of his fishing pole. He splashes his feet, toes peeking out of the river's surface, drops of water colouring the folded hems of his trousers around his knees.  _Well, it isn't like there's any fish to scare off._

“Fishing?”

“Taking me out to useless outings.” Roxis isn't looking at him, eyes locked forward, towards something Vayne couldn't see from the reflection in the water.

“Oh.” He stops, eyebrows furrowed and head tilted. “You don't?”

“I've never said that.” Their eyes meet, through the rippled mirror below them. Roxis drags his feet against the current, forms thin, white triangular lines of resistance around his ankles. The image of their faces distorts into a blur of colours, and Vayne almost wishes he has it in him to be brave – look up and to the right, to see Roxis' face from behind the curtains of his grey hair.

_'What kind of face is he making right now?'_

“I'm just saying that this is a waste of time.”

' _You're a waste of time,_ ' is what he hears instead.

Vayne doesn't see the rose-tinted tips of Roxis' ears, curls further into himself, looks down to his knees. He pulls his fishing rod closer, pretends that it could hide how heartbroken he feels.

 

* * *

 

 

His fingers passes through a whisper – soft strands gliding across his skin, as he unthinkingly combs down the length of Roxis's hair – lets them untangle and fall from the tips.

Roxis turns around sharply, face red, hair swishing back behind him. Vayne could feel every sharp blade of the mental daggers sent his way, amber eyes narrowed and hard, probably with a determination to cut him apart and leave him dead on the atelier floor.

He squeaks, heart rate racing. He's caught between a feeling of fear and marvel, his brain running a myriad of different thoughts in both miles and spades. Hands balled tight, knuckles white against his chest, Vayne starts forward, a baited breath.

“I―” Eyes screwed shut, and he bows deep, takes in a sharp draw of breath. “I'm sorry!” He tries not to think about how so incredibly soft Roxis' hair was, silk and satin tickling his skin. He really shouldn't have felt the tightness in his chest, not when he needs to  _run_ , step back and bow ten or twenty on his way out of the door, hopes that Roxis doesn't hate him even more than he already does. But he feels his heart lodged in his throat, blood pulsing in his ears, head like cotton, dizzying thoughts.

His shoes are a rather interesting colour today. A bit blurred around the edges, a little lighter than usual. Maybe there's something wrong with him.

“There was dust in your hair so I thought...” Vayne feels his cheeks warm, the outer edges of his eyes crinkle. He's muttering to the floor at this point, more of a conversation with the gray cobblestone under his feet than with Roxis, and it's probably for the best. He isn't quite sure what kind of face he's making right now, but he's sure it isn't one Roxis wants to see.

 

* * *

 

 

“Isn't it simple?”

Things hardly are in their atelier, but Vayne chooses not to comment. Philo hums an offbeat, airy tune as she stirs the cauldron twice, counter-clockwise, then once clockwise. Vayne watches the colour change, the dark cobalt concoction from before turning into something closer to the cherry blossoms in full bloom outside their window. Early mornings reminds him of a lot of things – a sleepy start to every other day, Philo with soot across the bridge of her nose, a faint flurry of dust under the beginnings of the sun's stream, a silent companionship.

“Are you being slow on purpose?  _Honestly,_  Vayne.”

He lets himself wander, into cool fog on the window pane, Roxis almost a shadow against the light. It's familiar, a scene he never tires of. Behind the door and across the room, sunlight seeping through the crack, he sees fingers turn a page of a book, finds his own curled loosely around the doorknob.

“You're asking me for help and you're not even listening,” Philo's voice brings him out of his memories. She has her cheeks puffed and she looks at him, thoroughly offended. The cauldron bubbles as white smoke starts to spirals upwards, taking Philo's slow, measured exhale along with it before she settles into a small smile. “Look, just talk to him, yeah?”

It's easier, perhaps, if he could think of the world as simple as Philo makes it out to be.

* * *

 

 

“I don't hate you,” Roxis says, almost idly, over a synthesis.

Vayne thinks that his heart might have dropped, taken from his chest, rolling off the tip of Roxis' fingers and into the cauldron. He distantly hears a small bubbling – of the ore just dropped, infusing into the mixture. There's a faint touch of smoke on his face, a caress that goes behind his ears and away. Roxis turns to look at him, _and he isn't dreaming._

He doesn't remember when he lets his hand fall slack, looks down to see the pestle he held leaning against the mortar's rim. Bits of crushed, dried herbs found their way onto his shoes and on to the floor – he's going to have to clean that later.

“Vayne―”

Maybe he's been spacing out longer than he must have thought. Longer than what's probably acceptable, at least. When he comes to, whipping his head towards the cauldron, he sees smoke, rapidly turning thick and inky black. He's starting to hear a sharp hiss, something that's definitely not right at all, that isn't supposed to happen, they should probably do  _something_ and not just stand around staring at what looks like an explosion in the making.

Vayne's shoots out an arm, a moment too late, maybe wouldn't have had made it otherwise, even when he was a few seconds earlier, but _he tries―_

And ultimately fails – receives instead, a hand completely covered in ashes, an entire day's worth of cleaning, and Roxis blinking at him in disbelief.

“ _Honestly,_ Vayne.” Voice soft and sweet after a beat of silence, quiet laughter behind soot covered faces. He's never seen Roxis' eyes crinkle with a gentle sort of amusement, heart worn on his sleeve for Vayne to look into, for Vayne to see the warmth beyond cold glass walls. Roxis has a curled hand brought to his lips, and Vayne feels his cheeks dust pink. He hears chuckling, barely there, near breathless,realises he's falling harder, deeper into―

Oh.

_Oh―_

_Had he been he wrong from the start?_

 

* * *

 

 

“It's difficult.” They're in the library, Vayne on the edge of an admittedly ill-timed nap, considering they were delegated by the group about a two hours ago to look for references. He blinks, rubs at his eyes to fight away impending sleep, looks up behind hazy prickles in his vision, finds Roxis muttering to the book in his hand, almost as if he hadn't meant for Vayne to hear. “I don't really know what you're thinking most of the time.”

 _I'm sorry,_  he thinks.  _I don't know what to say a lot of those times._

Roxis shakes he head, closes the book, and places it back on the shelf. His fingers traces across rows of book spines, stops on one and hovers, a millimetre away from the leather hard cover coating.

“I'm not sure what to tell you,” The words tumble from his lips, too far gone for him to have caught. “A lot of the things I think about makes you angry.”

“I apologise, that was not how it was supposed to come across.”

Vayne hears shuffling, Roxis turning around and sliding down to sit next to him, leans his head back against the wooden shelves with a quiet thump. He has a book cradled in his arms, leaves of parchment fluttering open as he sets it on his crossed legs, falls onto an open page about the anatomy of a camellia plant. It's related to their project, maybe. What they were originally sent here for. Vayne doesn't really remember.

“It would have been simpler,” Roxis breathes out, hair falling forward when he rests his cheek onto an open palm. “If we had been more honest.”

 _Simple._  It's that word again.

“We never had the chance to talk. Without unnecessary hostility.” He sighs, stops to find his next words. “It was my fault, I shut you out.”

Perhaps, he had said it in a dream, the lantern on the table across the room a blurred halation to him. Maybe, he had fallen into a world where he had agreed with Philo, that everything  _was_  simple. Friendly spars, companionable silences, feelings left unscathed. It would have been nice, if they were that.

They aren't. That's their reality.

Perhaps in worlds parallel to this one, where words comes easily to them, they've already settled into something different. Perhaps they could, in this world, too.

Vayne is willing to take the first step towards that possibility.

The scenery in front of him starts to fade away in scatters of static, the library dissolving into black. He feels an enveloping warmth, comfort seeping into him as he slowly falls asleep.

“Roxis, I―”

 

* * *

 

 

He takes the chance, in the spring of their last year, when he's left with only a hair's breadth between them.

“I want to understand you,” Vayne says.

They've been building bridges over the years, setting stones, working out the pieces that fit together. Vayne thinks he has the courage reach out this time, feel Roxis' hair weave through his fingers in the wind, finds his cheeks warm under a shower of cherry blossoms, realises Roxis' heart has been beating as hard as his.

He takes a step forward, stone pathways of the courtyard under his feet, crossing the last length of distance. Vayne  _wants_ – wants so much that it's overwhelms him.

To a future of possibilities, he takes Roxis's hand in his, bridging both of them together.

“I'm not sure where to go from here, but for now...”

He wants, from infinite worlds, for his to be one where he has a place next to Roxis.

“Please, tell me what's on your mind.”

 


End file.
